Animal Crossing: Fool
by Dance War
Summary: The stand-alone sequel to Lame Over, featuring a new cast, town and theme.
1. One

July 27, 2003  
  
11:58 P.M.  
  
Dana squinted and leaned foward, brushing the hair from her face. She stared at the computer screen for a moment, taking another long drag from her cigarette before sitting back in the chair and shaking her head. It wasn't the gay porn she'd found on her son's computer that really bothered her. The kid listened to Celine Dion, for Christ's sake. It wasn't much of a surprise. But in the same half-hidden folder (labeled "Math Homework", which immediately tipped her off as he never did his any of his goddamn homework, math or otherwise) she'd found dozens of pictures depicting grizzly crime scenes, suicides, or horrific accidents. For every erect penis or glistening he-man, there was a headless body or charred corpse. Did he find these photos erotic as well? Then why were they in the same folder?  
  
She closed the folder and turned off the computer. When finally she was enveloped in the complete darkness, and could no longer see herself hideously mirrored in the glare of the moniter, she began to cry. She sat, invisible, weeping into her apron, stopping occasionally to take a drag from her cigarette, which flared before tapering off, the only thing visible in the darkness, like a beacon on a briny sea.  
  
July 28, 2003  
  
7:34 A.M.  
  
Dom Crook surveyed the empty room, kicking at a used condom on the filthy dirt floor.  
  
The real-estate agent laughed politely, "Once you're settled in, Mr. Crook, I doubt any of the local kids will try anything like...that," she grimaced, "After all, the police station is right across the street."  
  
Dom nodded, "I suppose. It is a bit small, even smaller than my old shop."  
  
"Oh, you have another shop? That's great, it'll be like a little franchise!"  
  
"No," he said, running his finger along a dusty windowsill, "I had another shop, back in Lemon. Have you ever been?"  
  
"To Lemon? No, but my husband's sister used to live there."  
  
"Oh yeah?"  
  
"Yes, her name is Nosegay. She's in prison now, right here in Calistan. Right across the street! He likes it because she's closer, he can see her everyday."  
  
"Right across the street, did you say?" He sounded nervous.  
  
"Oh, don't you worry about a thing, Mr. Crook. She's locked up good and tight for a long time. A very long time, serves her right after what she did."  
  
"A-anyway," Crook said, "Back to the shop. How soon can I move in?"  
  
"Well, it'll take about a week for all the papers to be filed. Plus, the electricity and water need to be turned back on. I'd say you could be holding a grand opening in about three weeks!"  
  
He thought for a moment.  
  
"I'll take it." 


	2. Two

12:37 P.M.  
  
Dom Crook was the name chosen by the people at the governmental agency they'd been whisked away to last month. He didn't think it even had a name, just a handful of men in black suits, shiny sunglasses they wore even indoors, and various super-powerful computers.  
  
"Now," the one who looked like Will Smith had said, "This is your new identity. You are Dom Crook, married with two children. You come from Pakistan, but have lived in America twelve years. You like golfing, hunting, and Bollywood movies. Your wife is Patsy Crook, and your children are Dumb and Lousy. Do you follow?"  
  
He'd nodded, "Yes. Married, Pakistan, golfing, Dumb Crook and Lousy Crook. Got it."  
  
"Who is Tom Nook?"  
  
"I am."  
  
"No, you're Dom Crook. From Pakistan. Tom Nook is dead."  
  
And then, amazingly, they'd asked him where he'd wanted to live. They'd chosen his name, background, even his hobbies and interests, but it was up to him to decide where to set up shop. Go figure.  
  
"You're a fool," his wife had said to him, "A goddamn fool. They offer to put us up anywhere in the goddamn country, and where do you pick? Cali-fucking-stan, two goddamn feet from where we used to live. I swear, I should have listened to my mother! I could have married French Peterson! He's a millionare you know!"  
  
While it was true Calistan wasn't exactly as far from Lemon as, say, Los Angeles (where his children had wanted to go- he worried about them sometimes), it was far enough, and big enough, to remain confortably anonymous. He would open another shop, the kids could enroll in school, and his wife...well, she could find something she was good at, something she had skills for. Like a paperweight.  
  
"French Peterson," Dom muttered, shaking his head and watching the real estate agent climb awkwardly into the back of a cab through the building's grimy front window. French Peterson couldn't act his way out of a paper bag. He was currently starring in a thatrical version of "Pink Flamingos". He played Mama Edie, the retarded, egg-obsessed mother of the raging drag queen Divine. French Peterson was scum, something scraped off the bottom of boots. He'd finger-fucked Dom's wife once, when they were in high school together, but she insisted she could have married him and would have had a rich, glamorous Hollywood life. She was delusional.   
  
He moved closer to the window and looked out onto the cobbled street. There was the police station, seven stories high. There were outdoor merchants, huge multiplex theaters, Target stores. How was he going to compete with that? He didn't have the charm or novelties of the outdoor vendors or the selection or prices of the bigger chains. He was stuck in the middle, and he'd be lucky to last a month in a place like this.  
  
"What happens if we don't like our new life?" he'd asked one of the agents on their way back to the airport, "What if I can't get a job or one of the kids gets in a fight at their posh new school?"  
  
"Your children are going to a public school, Mr. Crook, where they will undoubtedly be the subject of merciless ridicule. If you don't like your new life, then I suggest you move. Just don't come crying to us, because we've done all that we can."  
  
He'd thought briefly about returning to Lemon. Mayor Tortimer, who ran the vicious but profitable crime ring he'd been a part of, was dead, as were most of the others. The rest, with the exception of Dom, were in jail. Even so, he didn't think he'd be able to ever safely set foot in Lemon again, much less move back and re-open his shop. He'd read in the papers that Officer Copper had been elected Mayor, and he didn't think he'd be as sympathetic as Tortimer was, if that was even possible. So they would just have to make due in Calistan, which was a big city often favorably compared to Ellis Island.  
  
"It's like a new beginning," Dom said, watching a young human woman with fiery red hair haggle with a street vendor over a loaf of stale, crusty bread.  
  
He turned around and surveyed the small, filthy space once again.  
  
"It's time to get to work." 


	3. Three

1:31 P.M.  
  
Dana said, "Pepsi Street, please."  
  
The driver was an older man with beefy arms and jowls. He looked up at her in the rear-view mirror and grunted, acknowledging her presence. They drove slowly through the heavy foot-traffic, the driver muttering as they pulled up behind an elderly feline woman on a bicycle.  
  
Dana opened her briefcase and tried to concentrate on her work, calculating the closing costs and drawing up her own fee in her head, but she found herself staring at the black and white photo of Mr. Crook's driver's license, the one she'd had her secretary fax over to her house last night. She had the strangest feeling she'd seen him before somewhere, maybe on television or in one of the papers. She'd shown the picture to her son Randy, who had shrugged, staring into his cereal bowl and saying, "Maybe his dinky little store got robbed and he was on the late edition, how should I know?"  
  
"Oh, Randy, honestly. You could be a little nicer you know."  
  
"Yeah, and I could be meaner too. You don't know how lucky you got it compared to some parents. At least I'm not out killing people or stealing money from your purse for needle drugs. Not that I would touch that ratty thing anyway. Faux fur is so last season, mom."  
  
She'd looked over at her purse, slumped dejectedly on the kitchen counter.  
  
"Anyway, I'm under a lot of pressure at school, ok?"  
  
"What, summer school?"  
  
He rolled his eyes but didn't say anything.  
  
"I really hate this fucking street," the driver was muttering, "Nothing but scuzzy peddlers and hookers and fags."  
  
"I didn't ask your opinion," she said sharply, "Just drive the fucking car."  
  
He looked up into the mirror again, visibly stunned. Obviously he was shocked to hear a woman speak to him so frankly, and with such conviction. His was a world of wives and mothers, women who cooked and cleaned and looked after the children.  
  
"I'm sorry I'm not at home, fixing a stew," she hissed, "But I have a job. I happen to make a lot more money than my husband as a matter of fact."  
  
He averted his gaze, turning up his radio and letting out an explosion of noxious gas. Dana choked and made to open her window, but there was no handle.  
  
The driver laughed much more than he needed to, all the way to Pepsi Street, where she refused to tip him and he drove off, his middle finger in the air, screaming, "Fuck you, lesbian!" 


	4. Four

1:56 P.M.  
  
Randy heard the door slam and his mother muttering as she made her way into the kitchen for some booze. What a fucking slob. She wondered why his father was having an affair with that Janet woman, but it was quite obvious to him. She was a drunken, angry loser: angry about her fading looks, her unfashionable wardrobe, her dead-end job selling broken-down shacks to miserable immigrant families, and she tended to take it out on her family, especially when she was on the sauce, which she almost always was.  
  
He shook his head and returned his attention to the computer screen, where several chat boxes were displayed. He could've kicked himself for not stumbling into Calistan M4M chat sooner. He had needs, and desires, he typed to the supposed 18 year-old with washboard abs and a great head of hair. Randy knew exactly who it was, it was that same guy with the beer-belly and gigantic mole on his neck who'd slipped him that note in a diner last week. He knew because he had the very peculiar habit of spelling his "the's" without the E. Idiot.  
  
I know who you are, Randy typed, and the window closed immediately. He laughed and turned to one of the other windows. He was just getting himself excited when he heard his mother calling him from the kitchen.  
  
"Oh, Jesus Christ!" he spat, pulling up his pants and waiting for his erection to quit. She had probably fallen in the cupboard again, or broken a bottle of her beloved fire water. It was only two o'clock and already she was wasted. At least his father waited until after five, when he got home from his REAL job. He didn't sell former crackhouses to Ethiopians, no sir. He was an editor at the Calistan Free Press, the city's oldest and most respected newspaper. He'd gotten his job as a result of years of backbreaking hard work, not by giving a BJ to the head of the department like a certain drunken witch he decided should remain nameless. He made his way down the stairs slowly, peeking around the corner into the kitchen. She was standing at the stove, stirring a pot and smiling at him.  
  
"Randy! I thought I heard you come down. Dinner's almost ready, would you set the table please?"  
  
"Dinner? It's only two o'clock. Dad won't be home for another three hours."  
  
"Your father isn't coming home tonight, honey. He says he's going on a business trip."  
  
"I don't blame him, if this is what he has to come home to. Well, I suppose if it's early enough to get hammered it's early enough for one of your abortions masquerading as a meal."  
  
She stared at him, mouth agape as she continued stirring her dreadful concoction. That's right, he thought, pulling the plates from the cabinet, stare. I'm young, fashionable, and desirable. You're nothing but a wasted zero, who'll most likely be forced into prostitution when Dad finally comes to his senses and divorces your ass.  
  
He grinned at her, and she gave him a faltering half-smile in return. 


End file.
